An aircraft is in general equipped with a monitoring system intended to analyze a plurality of parameters in order to monitor the correct operation of the various pieces of equipment of the aircraft. This system is composed of a machine for recording and monitoring the state of the aircraft called the aircraft condition monitoring system (ACMS). The ACMS is configured to acquire and store data originating from sensors and/or other equipment of the aircraft during each flight in order to monitor the performance of the various systems of the aircraft and detect malfunctions or anomalies.
More particularly, the ACMS is programmed to trigger an alert report when an anomaly is detected. Each report is transmitted by the aircraft in flight to a station on the ground in real-time via a data transmitting system called the aircraft communications addressing and reporting system (AGARS). The report consists of a snapshot of a state of the aircraft of a few seconds in length recorded around the detection of an anomaly. Of course, the stored data are very large in volume and it is not currently possible to transmit all these data from an aircraft in flight. In contrast, at the end of the flight, all the recorded data may be extracted from the ACMS via a special piece of equipment in order to carry out more detailed analyses if necessary.
This device is very effective but has a few drawbacks. In particular, each alert report is triggered based on criteria that are pre-set depending on a priori knowledge of the various avionic systems, and therefore do not cover all system conditions or all possible malfunctions. Specifically, the alert trigger is programmed depending on known properties of various parameters associated for example with their physical constraints and/or logic, thresholds, links with anomaly indicators, etc. It is thus probable that new anomalies that are unexpected or not preset will not be detected by the system. Thus, the implementation of these conditions and constraints in the ACMS enables only partial supervision of the avionic systems.
Furthermore, the data contained in the report transmitted to the ground may not be sufficient to analyze the anomaly detected on board the aircraft. Specifically, only the data contained in the reports transmitted by the aircraft are exploitable in real-time. The data saved by the ACMS between two successive triggers are exploitable only after the aircraft has landed. In addition, it is necessary to have access to the aircraft to collect these data.
The present disclosure provides a system and method for generating and transmitting alert reports from the aircraft without the aforementioned drawbacks, in particular by implementing autonomous on-board data processing allowing in real time a precise and complete report taking into account all the relevant data to be generated.